Five Years Later:

Today's one of those days that he doubts his own sanity and looking at the young man who just transferred to his department, he's definitely not alone. Having gotten a call about a homicide, they hurry to the location with sirens blaring. Now after checking it out, they sit outside while they wait for the forensics team to finish collecting evidence and photographing the crime scene. Damon's smoking a rare cigarette that Ric offers, chuckling slightly while watching the rookie trying to calm his now shattered nerves.

This is the first time he's ever seen at a real corpse, one that was brutally murdered and the sight of its disposition is stomach turning at best. The kid has impressive records from school and Damon personally thinks he's going to be alright.

Suddenly he turns a shade of pea green and before Damon finishes his thought, Luka's already running to the bushes to empty his stomach. Not that he can blame him, Damon did the same thing the first time he laid eyes on a grisly crime scene much like this one.

The body was supposed to decompose long ago but with the ground waters and clayish soil, the result surely wasn't the killer's intent. What they saw when they found Liam Davis' body is the worst side of their profession. Even though Damon is somewhat hardened, having to view the mummified corpse of what was once a handsome young man is anything but pleasant.

He knows what Davis looked like before, he's seen his picture and others many times when he helped set up the cold case squad at their precinct. Luka was bound to lose his meal seeing something like this for the first time.

"That bad, huh?" Ric comes to sit beside him. They both observe Luka's back visible from the distance. He didn't get too far. One of them or both will have to have a word with him later, so he doesn't get discouraged by this experience.

When Damon is called over by one of the forensic technicians, he nods at Ric and then follows the guy inside. The remains were found in the basement of an abandoned, barely standing shack.

Before they take the body to the morgue and onto Dr. Maxfield's table, Damon likes to absorb the atmosphere of the crime scene. He tries to work out the chain of events in his head. Carefully he studies every corner of the shabby and dank room. So deep in concentration, he doesn't even notice that Ric has joined him in the remote corner of that dilapidated building.

"What do you think killed him? A knife? Gun?"

"We'll know soon enough, I called the doc, he promised to start on it as soon as the body is there." He carefully squats down, examining the remains without touching them. "It's not that I can find a shot in this mess..."

He hears footsteps and only slightly moves his head to see that's indeed Luka.

"Are you alright?" Ric asks him, carefully studying the young man.

He nods and both detectives step aside to let him come closer. He needs encouragement.

"Look at the angle, the neck has been broken," Damon points out for him, "which doesn't necessarily mean it was the cause of death. Frankly, I don't believe it was. We have professionals that deal with the manner of death. They don't improvise or do sloppy work. We'll tell the doctor to look for a bullet, or a knife wound. Not on his neck though."

"Dr. Maxfield, right?"

"Yes," Damon answers, "our pathologist."

Luka seems to experience another wave of nausea and Damon urges him to leave. "Come on, Luka, we'll take a breath outside, we all need one."

Once outside, Luka seems to recover quite quickly, much better than before. Damon sighs mentally, he can remember with much specificity his first day in the homicide department. It was a murder suicide and not something he likes to think about.

Atticus Shane is spending the afternoon with his son, as his wife Caitlin needs a break from their son Sam's never ending questions and inexhaustible energy supply. He enjoys it immensely, although as a professor he's not doing anything unusual. He loves teaching the kids, he never gets tired of it.

Sometimes he wonders if Sam won't hate it when he's older and has to attend school himself. Atticus always thought he's going to be a patient and reasonable parent, but who knows what will his own children think of his methods one day. Yes, children. That's why Caitlin needs as much of rest as she can get.

Having worn out his usually robust father, Sam retreats for a bit to play with their dog Silas. There's no doubt he'll come back for more but for now, maybe Atticus can do something useful? He heads in to the cellar once he calls at his boy not to leave their yard and to shout if he needs anything. He's pretty sure Silas wouldn't let anything happen to him, since Sam was born, Silas has been his personal bodyguard.

Atticus descends the staircase and persuades himself to start sorting out all the things that accumulated over the years. They bought the house a couple years back but never threw out some of the needless furniture and other things properly. He just never took the time to go through everything that was left here when he and Caitlin moved in. If he starts right now, he can have a good portion done by night fall.

"What made you decide to join the cold case department?" Luka asks when they're sitting in the office, going over their notes while waiting for the doctor's call. Damon and Ric share glances.

"Well," Damon starts, "My favorite uncle, Adriano, he was everyone's favorite really, even kids that weren't related to him. He was a bachelor, never married but he was a troop leader for the boy scouts, coached little league baseball. Everybody loved him. Some people thought it was weird, you know, a single guy hanging around boys but he wasn't any of those things, he was a good man. I loved him a lot. One day, he simply vanished, his house was spotless, there were no signs of a struggle, nothing. A few years later, they found his remains in his car at the bottom of Morris Lake. My dad always believed that he had been murdered, he thought maybe someone believed the rumors about him.

All that time under the water, the remains were skeletal by the time they fished his body out. He did have a skull fracture but the coroner believed that he suffered that injury when he crashed into the murky depths. Since there was nothing left, there's no way to know whether he drown or whether the head injury killed him. The head injury was such that it would have likely have proven fatal even if he had been found right away. Before his body was recovered, his case ended up in the hands of the cold case squad and that's how I knew I wanted to work here."

Although he had high hopes, cleaning up the mess is not going as fast as Atticus would have wished, but he did manage to throw out some of the larger pieces and fill several bags with junk. When Caitlin comes to join them after her nap, she keeps an eye on Sam and helps Atticus with sorting out some of the trinkets he's found. She leaves a little while later to start on dinner and takes Sam into the house with her.

It's getting darker outside but the light in the cellar is enough. The sounds from the club also start to be heard. Atticus loves their house, however the club is the reason why he sometimes thinks about moving, especially with another baby on the way. When he catches sight of a basket under the stairs, he approaches it, crashing against the wall when he trips on a single roller skate. Plaster reins down on him and he realizes the that he's literally crashed through the dry wall.

He looks into the hole but all he sees is darkness so he gets up to pick up a flashlight. He turns it on and peeks inside again, the light illuminating a hidden room that he never knew existed. He doesn't remember this space being on the blueprints when they looked them over before they put a bid down on the house. The room is empty except for a big barrel. He walks closer, startling when he feels something brush against his legs, he relaxes when he realizes it's Silas.

The dog starts acting strangely, scratching and barking at it. Curious, he sets the flashlight down and begins to pry the lid open...

"We'll be right there, doc," Damon says and hangs up his phone. Together, Damon, Ric and Luka walk down to the morgue to talk to Dr. Maxfield.

The corpse is nearly devoid of skin, pitted by burrowing insects and covered with blow fly larvae. Although he's a veteran of laying eyes on some particularly heinous murder scenes, Damon turns away when he feels his own stomach heave, his nostrils filling with the smell of the rotting remains. "I need a respirator, Doc."

Dr. Wes hands them each one then pulls back more of he sheet. "He was strangled, the hyoid bone is crushed, I believe the neck was broken post mortem, over kill if you will."

"So we may have a psychopath out there?" Damon mentions, his eyes meeting the doctor's.

"I can't answer that, Damon. That's your department but maybe someone just really hated Liam Davis."

Just as he opens his mouth to ask another question, Damon's phone rings. He steps away from the slab so he can pull his mask down. Ric watches him nodding his head as his other hand fists at his side. Moments later he shoves his phone back in his pocket.

"We have to go, Doc. Let us know if you find anything else."

"Of course," Wes says, pushing the body back in the cooler as soon the men leave the room.

Not even a half hour later Damon parks his car in front of the house. There's already a forensic team and a couple of police cars on scene. Moments later he finds himself in Shane's crawlspace, staring at the squid tattoo on a perfectly preserved arm.

"Hello Jeremy, I've been looking for you for a very long time."

Jeremy is the man in chapter 1.

Thanks so much to all of you for the wonderful reviews and interest in the prologue. We're both giddy happy. I will caution you though that this story is very *slow burn*. The chapters will be getting longer.

Thank you Eva for all of your help and devotion to this and all of our stories.

Chapter title: 'Shadows of the Past' by Omega.

Thank you all again, you're the best of the DE universe. Have a safe and wonderful day. We'll see you next with November Rain 12.